Czech connection and Zeman support could smooth early interaction with
Trump presidency: Hynek Kmoníček

If you’re looking for a Czech who probably has a good take on what the
Donald Trump presidency has in store it’s the director of president
Miloš Zeman’s foreign affairs office, Hynek Kmoníček. He took up that
post after stints as Czech ambassador to India, Australia, and the United
Nations. And Kmoníček is the hot tip to become the next Czech ambassador
in Washington, likely taking up the post within a few weeks. I asked him
first of all what the Trump presidency priorities would be.

Donald Trump, photo: CTK
“Obviously, it’s very hard to predict in detail because it’s
‘Let’s Make America Great Again,’ and it’s the typical political
slogan which covers everything and nothing in detail. But what we can
assume is that President Trump probably will be a sort of remake of
Nixonian policy of the early 1970s, meaning that he will try to solve some
inherited problems and that he will be very much dealing within a triangle
of the United States, Russian Federation, China. And if Nixon had his
problems with [Leonid] Brezhnev-style leadership in Moscow not getting the
message, and that’s why he went to Beijing, we sort of expect that this
will basically be the policy of Donald Trump. Basically, that his first
priority now to deal with on the foreign political scene will be the
Russian Federation and on reaching some results on the Russian-American
link, he will try to capitalize on them on the, up till now, quite
disruptive American-Chinese link. But his is obviously just professing from
the, the, crystal ball.

So where does that leave Europe…is Europe is a sideshow then? Or is the
main message for Europe to get its act together, spend more on defense, and
fall into line with what his ideas are?

Hynek Kmoníček, photo: Šárka Ševčíková
“That’s my expectation, with all the talk now about Brexit, which is
quite unclear about what Britain will want and can get from the EU, it will
be a quite complicated process. From the American perspective, most
probably the first focus will be on the security and defense area,
especially on NATO structures, where in our analysis there will be pressure
on bigger spending and expenditures which are expected at the level of 2
percent of GDP from the nations so that they are not as they are called
‘free riders’. And we as the Czech Republic should not have a problem
with that push because we also believe that security is not automatic and
that it is not for free. What we see, let’s say, as the area of
discussion is that NATO should be able to focus its attention in the
imminent threats to our Western civilization, including the threat of
Islamic State. That message is coming from Washington as well. And the
thing that we think could be the potential danger is the thing we expect
and need the least, that is for NATO to end up in the basket of
organisations which will be branded as establishment. As we know, the Trump
movement has been technically defined as the movement which fights with the
establishment. So we hope that NATO will not be seen as the establishment
but as the basic, vital, and crucial alliance on the trans-Atlantic link.
And that should be one of the priorities on both sides.”

And as regards the team, the people Mr. Trump has nominated for his top
position, does that give you any lead or better insight into what his
intentions are or is it still confusing because many of the appointees have
different positions?

“Well, I think there is an ongoing discussion about how much the
president-elect will in his presidency be influenced by advisors, other
offices, congresses, and that’s why it is important which people will be
selected for the positions. But the previous history of the president-elect
shows that he is usually not much influenced by the outside forces and the
choice of his nominees show that he is relatively conservative, that he
tries to satisfy more streams and parts within the Republican Party. And
because he tries to satisfy, let’s say, many branches, then, obviously,
many of their ideas are not necessarily part of the same flock. But the
basic question for me is how much the presidency of Donald Trump will be
influenced by other people than Donald Trump himself. And up till now the
analysis of his story leads me to the answer: ‘not much.’”

He’s a self-made man in many ways…Final question, does the Czech
Republic have some credit in store with the future presidency given two
factors: one the [Czech] background of his former wife and, two, the fact
that President Zeman was an outspoken backer of his candidacy?

Miloš Zeman, photo: Filip Jandourek
“Well, for a country of the size of the Czech Republic, of course it’s
a matter of pride that after 45 presidents of the United States we have one
that made it even up to Zlín and has children who can understand the Czech
language. It gives us a certain PR edge, but you cannot overestimate it.
Our Czech-American relation is not based on the personalities but the
shared values and the same style of civilization, if I may say it so
obviously. Czech president Miloš Zeman was the only head of state in the
old continent who openly supported Mr. Trump even before the election. As
he likes to say, many supported him after the election. And we believe it
will definitely at least partially help us at the beginning of the
conversation. But we know that conversations are only repeated if they have
practical results. And as we have quite a number of points on the
Czech-American agenda where we think we can be quite useful to each other,
we believe not just in the past of Mr. Trump to be the card but also the
results of the first conversation between the presidents which hopefully
happen as they both agreed in their last telephone conversation to be at
the end of April in Washington. So, I think it will be a challenging time,
a time full of unpredictability. But you know what, we are used to
unpredictability in Central Europe.”